Duke University cancels plans to broadcast Muslim call-to-prayer

UPDATE: Duke University officials announced this afternoon they have canceled plans to allow the school’s Muslim Student Association to chant their call-to-prayer from the chapel bell tower. The students will instead gather in the campus quad before walking together to a room in the chapel for their weekly prayer meeting.

“Duke remains committed to fostering an inclusive, tolerant, and welcoming campus for all of its students,” said Michael Schoenfeld, vice president for public affairs and government relations. “However, it was clear that what was conceived as an effort to unify was not having the intended effect.”

Muslim students have been holding prayer services in the private university’s chapel’s basement for the last two years.

OUR EARLIER REPORT (3 p.m. EST): The Muslim call-to-prayer chant will be projected from the bell tower of Duke University’s famous chapel every Friday, according to an announcement released by the Durham, N.C., university on Tuesday.

The call-to-prayer, known as the Adhan, directs Muslims to worship Allah and offers a reminder to serve their neighbors, Imam Adeel Zeb, Duke’s Muslim chaplain, told Duke Today.

“The collective Muslim community is truly grateful and excited about Duke’s intentionality toward religious and cultural diversity,” he said.

Members of the Muslim Students Association will recite the call-to-prayer, which will be “moderately amplified,” according to the school. The chant will last for about three minutes and corresponds to the prayer meeting held by the association in the chapel.

Duke was founded by Methodists and Quakers and its divinity school has historically been connected to the United Methodist Church. But Christy Lohr Sapp, associate dean for religious life, said the move shows the school’s commitment to religious pluralism. The chapel also is used by Catholic, evangelical, Hindu, and Buddhist groups.

“Just as the bells announce chapel worship in the building on Sundays, the Adhan announces Muslim prayers on Fridays,” the school said on its website.

But the move toward “religious pluralism” isn’t universal: Duke chose not to renew its contract with Chick-fil-A after campus LGBT activists protested the company over its president’s support for traditional marriage.

Franklin Graham criticized the call-to-prayer decision on his Facebook page, encouraging alumni and donors to withhold their support unless the policy is reversed.

“As Christianity is being excluded from the public square and followers of Islam are raping, butchering, and beheading Christians, Jews, and anyone who doesn’t submit to their Sharia Islamic law, Duke is promoting this in the name of religious pluralism,” the president and CEO of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association and Samaritan’s Purse wrote.

According to the school, more than 700 students identify as Muslim this school year. The school hired its first full-time Muslim chaplain in 2009.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.